First published in The Tab, 10 March 2010

The Footlights’ Smoker audience is the most obliging, generous and compliant audience of any comedy show I’ve ever seen. To the point of complicity. At least at the Howler, the acts know if they’ve been shit; at a Smoker, everyone is applauded with the same raucous enthusiasm you’d get from a room filled with your friends. Which is, of course, exactly how the Smoker audience is constituted.

It dawned on me yesterday, as I cast my eye over the bar in the ADC, how dreadfully close-knit the Cambridge comedy ecosystem is. You only had to listen to the “Darling, how are you?”, the “Sweetheart, lovely to see you!” and the “You were wonderful, babe!” to realise it. I’ve always hated ostentatious mutual admiration, but the luvviedom in that bar was something to behold. Lanky sycophants in skinny jeans, wanky cardigans and retro specs. How very predictable, and how very tiresome. Read the rest of this entry »